Advanced
Operators
Google supports several advanced operators, which are
query words that have special meaning to Google. Typically these operators
modify the search in some way, or even tell Google to do a totally
different type of search. For instance, "link:" is a special operator, and
the query [link:www.google.com] doesn't do a normal search but instead
finds all web pages that have links to www.google.com.
Several of the more common operators use punctuation
instead of words, or do not require a colon. Among these operators are OR,
"" (the quote operator), - (the minus operator), and + (the plus
operator). More information on these types of operators is available on
the Basics of Search
page. Many of these special operators are accessible from the Advanced Search page, but
some are not. Below is a list of all the special operators Google
supports.
 |
| cache: |
|
If you include other words in the query, Google
will highlight those words within the cached document. For instance,
[cache:www.google.com web] will show the cached content with the
word "web" highlighted.
This functionality is also accessible by clicking
on the "Cached" link on Google's main results page.
The query [cache:] will show the version
of the web page that Google has in its cache. For instance,
[cache:www.google.com] will show Google's cache of the Google
homepage. Note there can be no space between the "cache:" and the
web page url.
|
| |
|
|
| link:
|
|
The query [link:] will list webpages that
have links to the specified webpage. For instance,
[link:www.google.com] will list webpages that have links pointing to
the Google homepage. Note there can be no space between the "link:"
and the web page url.
This functionality is also accessible from the Advanced Search
page, under Page Specific Search > Links.
|
| |
|
|
| related: |
|
The query [related:] will list web pages
that are "similar" to a specified web page. For instance,
[related:www.google.com] will list web pages that are similar to the
Google homepage. Note there can be no space between the "related:"
and the web page url.
This functionality is also accessible by clicking
on the "Similar Pages" link on Google's main results page, and from
the Advanced
Search page, under Page Specific Search > Similar.
|
| |
|
|
| info:
|
|
The query [info:] will present some
information that Google has about that web page. For instance,
[info:www.google.com] will show information about the Google
homepage. Note there can be no space between the "info:" and the web
page url.
This functionality is also accessible by typing the
web page url directly into a Google search box.
|
 |
| define: |
|
The query [define:] will provide a definition of
the words you enter after it, gathered from various online sources.
The definition will be for the entire phrase entered (i.e., it will
include all the words in the exact order you typed them).
|
| |
|
|
| stocks:
|
|
If you begin a query with the [stocks:] operator,
Google will treat the rest of the query terms as stock ticker
symbols, and will link to a page showing stock information for those
symbols. For instance, [stocks: intc yhoo] will show information
about Intel and Yahoo. (Note you must type the ticker symbols, not
the company name.)
This functionality is also available if you search
just on the stock symbols (e.g. [ intc yhoo ]) and then click on the
"Show stock quotes" link on the results page.
|
 |
| site: |
|
If you include [site:] in your
query, Google will restrict the results to those websites in the
given domain. For instance, [help site:www.google.com] will find
pages about help within www.google.com. [help site:com] will find
pages about help within .com urls. Note there can be no space
between the "site:" and the domain.
This functionality is also available through Advanced Search
page, under Advanced Web Search > Domains.
|
| |
|
|
| allintitle:
|
|
If you start a query with [allintitle:], Google
will restrict the results to those with all of the query words in
the title. For instance, [allintitle: google search] will return
only documents that have both "google" and "search" in the title.
This functionality is also available through Advanced Search
page, under Advanced Web Search > Occurrences.
|
| |
|
|
| intitle:
|
|
If you include [intitle:] in your query,
Google will restrict the results to documents containing that word
in the title. For instance, [intitle:google search] will return
documents that mention the word "google" in their title, and mention
the word "search" anywhere in the document (title or no). Note there
can be no space between the "intitle:" and the following word.
Putting [intitle:] in front of every word in your
query is equivalent to putting [allintitle:] at the front of your
query: [intitle:google intitle:search] is the same as [allintitle:
google search].
|
| |
|
|
| allinurl:
|
|
If you start a query with [allinurl:], Google will
restrict the results to those with all of the query words in the
url. For instance, [allinurl: google search] will return only
documents that have both "google" and "search" in the url.
Note that [allinurl:] works on words, not
url components. In particular, it ignores punctuation. Thus,
[allinurl: foo/bar] will restrict the results to page with the words
"foo" and "bar" in the url, but won't require that they be separated
by a slash within that url, that they be adjacent, or that they be
in that particular word order. There is currently no way to enforce
these constraints.
This functionality is also available through Advanced Search
page, under Advanced Web Search > Occurrences.
|
| |
|
|
| inurl:
|
|
If you include [inurl:] in your query, Google
will restrict the results to documents containing that word in the
url. For instance, [inurl:google search] will return documents that
mention the word "google" in their url, and mention the word
"search" anywhere in the document (url or no). Note there can be no
space between the "inurl:" and the following word.
Putting "inurl:" in front of every word in your
query is equivalent to putting "allinurl:" at the front of your
query: [inurl:google inurl:search] is the same as [allinurl: google
search]. | |